Ukraine has a highly developed agriculture and it should help Pakistan in improving its agriculture productivity by sharing knowledge & expertise and transferring technology. This was said by Mian Shaukat Masud, President, Islamabad Chamber of Commerce & Industry (ICCI) while talking to a delegation of Ukraine’s agriculture sector that called on him at ICCI led by Mr. Igor Potapov. He said Pakistan was also predominantly an agrarian economy. It had a vibrant livestock sector and was the 5th largest producer of milk in the world. But Pakistan could not fully exploit its strengths in the agriculture and livestock sector due to lack of technology. He said Ukranian cooperation in value addition of agricultural and dairy products would pave the way for the establishment of strong agro-based industries in Pakistan. He said Pakistan offered a lot of opportunities for Ukrainian businessmen in different sectors to set up industries in Pakistan on 100% equity basis or in the form of joint ventures with Pakistani businessmen.

ICCI President said that Ukraine was a major center of Ex-Soviet Union's, heavy industry and it was another area where both countries could benefit by collaborating with each other. He said Ukraine was producing equipment for different kinds of energy like solar, thermal, hydro and wind mill and it should help Pakistan in reducing the current energy crunch by providing energy equipment and expertise from installation to generation of electricity. He said opportunities also existed for cooperation between the heavy industry establishments of Ukraine and the engineering sector of Pakistan in the form of joint ventures.

Speaking on the occasion, Ukranian delegation members said the political relations between Pakistan and Ukraine were exemplary based on very good understanding at all levels. Both the countries had common position on majority of international as well as regional issues. However, they said bilateral trade was not up to the mark despite the fact that there was vast scope for cooperation as both countries had much more to complement each other. They said they would like to use their expertise in the area of agriculture to support Pakistan in upgrading its agriculture. They said they were on an exploratory visit to Pakistan to see the possibilities of collaboration in agriculture field with particular focus on sunflower potential. They said due to lack of information about each other’s potential, Pakistan and Ukraine could not exploit their mutual strengths in different fields and stressed for enhancing business-to-business and people-to-people contacts between the two countries to give boost to the existing level of trade and economic relations up to potential.